(1) Some measures that are sold as the practical application of the principle of tolerance. In the case of a few of these, that what is advocated is not tolerance but a symptom of an ailment whose origin is lacking self-confidence and collective guilt.

A repeat offender, who committed a brutal murder while in an early release program, came up with an interesting defense. He explained to have killed because he missed jail. As the trial moved toward the sentencing, the accused fought to avoid a life sentence. Can anyone detect the inconsistency that the court could not?

(2) Be prepared for a new plea to avoid being condemned. Welfare cheaters have come up with a new defense to claim innocence and plead for dismissal. Cheating has been made easy for them by lack of enforcement, precedent, and the intent of case workers not to notice anything. Through that, they were enticed to believe that what they do is not wrong while the access to money was too tempting to be resisted. 

The claim is ingenious. Therefore, internationally, the approach is likely to be copied.

 

(3) The crooks are mostly ahead of the cops. An escaped slave has led the police to liberate his nineteen comrades. Most of the indentured were Gypsies. Now, you probably think that the venue is some backwoods place with a tradition of involuntary servitude. All that is very reasonable but also very wrong. This happened in Canada.

The ordeal began when agents induced them to travel as tourists to Canada. After arriving, they were made to ask for refugee status. Once allowed as beneficiaries of victim status to stay, documents were faked for the asylum seekers to receive aid. With the paperwork completed their protectors became their captors. 

The fake refugees were fed garbage and pet food while they were forced by their fellow ethnics to work without pay. The captors lived off the welfare money sent to support the victims of discrimination in the old country. Part of what made the case possible is that Canada accepts the leftist-liberal story about racist dictatorship in Hungary. Acting on that premise, she accepts as refugees criminals that are wanted in Hungary. 

The reassuring aspect of the matter is that PC standards mitigate the slavery charge. The perpetrators as well as most victims are Gypsies so that white crime against people of color plays no role in the case.

 

(4) Kofi Annan’s role in world politics might not be decisive but it can be interesting. As the mediator between Assad and the rest of the world -minus China and Russia- Annan warned of a further militarization of the conflict whose massacres enliven the news. He also hoped that no one is thinking of using more violence and called upon the Syrian opposition to cooperate. Being slaughtered in order to avoid “more violence” might be a wish that the Syrians, even if warned of a “civil war”, might find resistible.

It is of little surprise that once in Syria, Annan’s mission failed. Assad's heroic determination to resist until the last Syrian is dead remains unshaken. 

 

(5) An old leftist B-tier writer who is more fact resistant than he is experience driven has gone on the record in a way that guarantees him the cultural establishment’s support. “I am a Socialist, I am a leftist Socialist, I had my communistic dreams, and I still have them. However, should I have been conquered, I would have, nevertheless, preferred to be conquered by the Americans.” 

The statement tells more than it intends to reveal. (1) It helps to discover the relationship between confessed socialism and more radical private agendas. (2) The past tense of “conquest” shows that he knows who the source of conquest used to be. (3) Wanting communism but not wishing to be taken to that goal in a Sovietized Western Europe shows some logical inconsistency. The two preferences amount to saying, “I want to swim, but since I prefer not to get wet you go into the water”. (4) While American conquest has never been an option, assuming its availability could be wishful thinking and thus demonstrate a lack of realism. On the other hand, the preference also betrays a good portion of common sense by someone that claims to be moved by ideals.

 

(6) Iran’s nukes. As the window of opportunity for prevention closes, the debate about how to avoid the obvious intensifies. Those who like to worry only when it is too late see the threat diminished by the hope that Iran’s leaders will act rationally. The rationality of newcomers is central concern of the traditional members of the nuclear club. Given inevitable total destruction in response to the use of nukes, conventional thinking holds that there are many reasons to acquire the bomb. Using it as a strategic weapon is not one of them. Mutual assured destruction operated on this principle.

Will the rationality of the Mullahs save the world -starting with Israel- from mayhem? 

Iran’s leadership is rational. This is so even if most observers doubt it. The term needs definition. What is rational is determined by a consensus that involves a factual base and its implications. Our agreed upon rationality is the product of the Enlightenment and the scientific revolution. The societies of the advanced world share this tradition and so they operate based on compatible premises. 

The Mullahs are also rational even if they operate within a framework that departs from the one that determines what is reasonable in the modern world. Within the frame of reference of what they regard as truth and worth knowing, subject to the limits set by the education they had, their policies are rational.

The alluded clash of contradictory rationalities is illustrated by a classical joke. The visitor of the nuthouse enters a room in the middle of which a man hangs from the ceiling. Aghast, he asks what is going on. “He is hanging because he thinks that he is a chandelier”. “He will suffocate, cut him off!” “If we do that we will be left in the dark”. 

 

(7) Greece has, with the help of the EU’s governments that made themselves captives of her vicissitudes, managed to have most of its debt canceled. The official EU will react by rewarding Greece with another 130 Billion. Except for drunken sailors, for a generation investors will grace Greece by avoiding her. Indeed, it is better use the money to get drunk. That at least leaves one with a hangover. That beats having a headache for having shredded money for hot air in return. It must be a good sign that in years, Greece, after more injections of vitamins, might recover to achieve Italian conditions. This happens to be the optimistic expectation. It is an encouraging that the admitted deficit grew from 7 to 7.5 %. Cutting back when a stimulus is needed will hinder the implementation of austerity. Unless ameliorated by cheating, belt-tightening could impose “government by riot” upon Greece. As this is written, there is more talk of another sack of billions.  

One gets the impression that the fat truth is hidden behind an emaciated telephone pole. It takes much effort not to notice.